Hit-and-run Pulls In 2nd Lawmaker State Will Ask Gallagher About Selph's Accident

July 24, 1986|By Harry Straight and Donna O'Neal of The Sentinel Staff (Reporters Tom Scherberger and Maya Bell contributed to this story.)

The investigation into an early morning hit-and-run accident in Tallahassee that caused minor damage to two cars has reached out to grab state Rep. Tom Gallagher, a Republican candidate for governor.

Leon County State Attorney Willie Meggs said Wednesday he wants to talk to Gallagher and anyone else with information about the May 13 accident that involved state Rep. Carl Selph, R-Casselberry, and Orlando lobbyist Ken Powell. There were no injuries.

Powell first told police he was driving, then he denied it. Selph denied driving, then admitted it. Both have been charged with filing a false report. Meggs said Wednesday he wants to know if others, including Gallagher, were involved in trying to cover up the accident.

Gallagher and two of his campaign aides had a party with Selph in a Tallahassee hotel room shortly after Selph drove his car into a parked vehicle about a block from the hotel, the St. Petersburg Times said Wednesday.

Gallagher said he was not involved in a cover-up and did not know until the next day about the accident, which caused about $2,400 damage to the two cars. ''Obviously some people have not been up front with us. . . . If they hampered the investigation, we'd like to find out,'' Meggs said.

Gallagher campaign manager Neil Richardson called the Times report ''contradictory'' and ''brutal.'' Gallagher said it was ''full of innuendoes.''

It was too early to assess the political damage of the story, Richardson said, but it clearly has caused Gallagher trouble.

He was campaigning in St. Petersburg and spent most of the day answering reporters' questions. Gallagher's running mate, state Rep. Betty Easley, R- Largo, and drugstore magnate Jack Eckerd, his biggest financial supporter, are from Pinellas County where the paper circulates.

Pinellas is a Republican stronghold that Gallagher hopes will help catapult him past the two front-runners, former Tampa Mayor Bob Martinez and former U.S. Rep. Lou Frey Jr. of Winter Park, in the Sept. 2 primary.

On the night of the party, Gallagher said, he was on the 11th floor of the Tallahassee Hilton with Richardson, press aide Bill DiPaolo and two women who worked for the Florida Medical Association, Mary Kay Samorisky and Anita Suddeth.